Sunday, May 27, 2012

Just when you thought that you have heard about
every bad thing that can happen to a sleep apnea sufferers, two more studies
come out that suggest that there is a connection between cancer and sleep
apnea.

The New York Times Well Blog describe how one of the
tests in Spain suggested thatthe most
severe sleep apnea patients have a 65 percent chance of developing cancer than
those folks without it. The other study was in Wisconsin where they looked at
1500 government workers and determined that they have 5 times the rate of dying
from cancer than those who don’t have sleep apnea.

Of course these tests aren’t a 100 percent certainty
that there is a connection between sleep apnea and cancer, but it does make you
wonder. I’d imagine that the use of CPAP on a regular basis would probably be
helpful at lowering the odds of getting cancer from sleep apnea, but the report
didn’t look at that.

Sunday, May 20, 2012

I remember as a child having episodes of
sleepwalking. It really didn’t seem to bother me much until I woke during a
walk in the middle of night in another room in the house. It was very
disorienting to slowly realize that you don’t know where you are. My parent
didn’t seem concerned assuming that I would just outgrow it and I did. I
wondered whether my other sleep problem, which is sleep apnea, might have
something to do with that.

According to Science Daily “Nearly
1 in 10 patients with obstructive sleep apnea also experience
"parasomnia" symptoms such as sleepwalking, hallucinations and acting
out their dreams” which seems strange to me considering how little sleep folks
with apnea get but there is a study from Loyola University Chicago Stritch
School of Medicine to back it up.

Sleepwalking occurs during the “deep
sleep” stage of sleep. What causes it is unknown but it might be because of
mental disorders, medications, fatigue and alcohol. The majority of cases happen
to children. Folks would do sleepwalk have their eyes open and they may do a
number of routine activities around the house, although they wouldn’t remember
them later.

A recent study has suggested that nearly
30 percent of folks in a study have had some kind of sleep walking occurrence
as an adult or child according to webmd.com. These numbers have dramatically
increased over the past 30 years.

Sunday, May 13, 2012

Sleep apnea has become a major health risk for an
ever growing segment of the population. Why now? There are a couple reasons
such as sleep disorders and sleep apnea in particular has gotten a lot of press
over the years as health in general is being closely watched. Lack of sleep can
lead to more problems than just being tired. Another health issue that is
connected to sleep apnea is being overweight. The excess pounds are a major
contributing fact to sleep apnea where fat in the face and neck areas can cause
blockage in the back of the throat. One group of folks that seem to be affected
by this is NFL players.

According to
a story on ABC GMA “A new medical study finds that
up to one-third of NFL players have sleep apnea, a disorder that creates
serious health risks and increases the chance that players will not get a good
night's sleep before they hit the gridiron.”

That is mind boggling but certainly believable
considering excess weight is a big part of sleep apnea. Being over 300 pounds
isn’t out of the norm for a lot of players especially line men. And having a
large thick neck along with being heavy also ups the odds of getting sleep
apnea.

It seems certain that the league is
taking sleep apnea very seriously considering all the health risks that are involved
for the players.

Sunday, May 6, 2012

The most common treatment for sleep apnea is using a
CPAP machine where air is pushed through a tube into your throat to keep your
airway open. While it sounds rather simple there are quite a few issues that
are involved with this process with the biggest being the comfort of wearing a
mask at night and having air forced into your throat. Not everyone can get used
to the mask but many do. What does get a little tricky is how much air pressure
is taken through the mask. This is called titration.

If you think that you have sleep apnea your first
step should be to your general practitioner who will send you on to a sleep
specialist, who are typically ENTs or pulmonologists (respiratory doctors). If
the sleep specialist thinks that you may have sleep apnea then they will set up
a sleep study which will determine whether you have sleep apnea or not.

In my case the first sleep study was just to
determine if I had sleep apnea whereas some folks have a split study where the
second half of the night the sleep technicians put a CPAP mask on you.The technicians will monitor your sleeping or
lack of it from another room. They can also adjust the amount of air that is
going through your CPAP mask. Hopefully at the end of the study the sleep techs
will have enough information to send to your doctor to recommend a titration
setting on the CPAP machine.

If you do decide to try the CPAP machine the
titration rate will be adjusted for you by a sleep tech. usually a nurse or
someone who specializes in CPAP setting will come out to your house with the
CPAP and set it up for you.